Keystone and the Udall-Gardner race

This story is part of an ongoing POLITICO series on how national policy issues are affecting the 2014 midterm elections.

WELD COUNTY, Colo. — For Democrats hoping to hold on to the Senate, the fault line in U.S. energy politics runs through communities like this rural enclave in the shadow of the Rocky Mountains.

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This county north of Denver is central to Colorado’s fracking boom, a place where oil and gas equipment dots the countryside and there’s one active well for every dozen or so residents. Its congressman, Rep. Cory Gardner, is a rising Republican star — and he’s threatening to unseat freshman Democratic Sen. Mark Udall, who is caught in the middle on energy issues that have split his party, including the Keystone XL oil pipeline and proposals to place fracking restrictions on the state’s November ballot.

The contest is playing out in a state whose oil and gas industry accounted for nearly 48,000 jobs and more than $3 billion in employee income in 2012, according to a University of Colorado study. But the state also has a long conservation heritage, and the spread of oil and gas production has stirred a backlash in some previously untouched towns.

The push-pull between environmental stewardship and job creation in Colorado has echoes in other states touched by the surge in North American energy production, from California to Pennsylvania. And it shows how intensely a national policy issue can play out locally — voter by voter, community by community — in a race that may tip the balance of power in Washington.

Much like President Barack Obama, Udall offers nuanced positions on some of the hottest energy controversies: He insists he has no stance on the merits of Keystone, saying, “I don’t think we should make a final decision until we see what the science tells us.” He supports fracking, if it’s done responsibly. And while he opposes letting voters change the state constitution to limit fracking through ballot initiatives — something liberal Democratic Rep. Jared Polis is pushing for in November — he’s open to a legislative compromise that could allow more local control of drilling.

Gardner’s positions, meanwhile, couldn’t be clearer: pro-Keystone, pro-fracking and eager to paint his opponent as indecisive. “This is typical of Mark Udall, that he tries to have it both ways,” Gardner said, calling it “shameful” that the senator hasn’t taken a clearer position on the anti-fracking measures.

Hanging over everything is the specter of Tom Steyer, the climate activist billionaire whose operatives have spoken with Polis about joining the fracking fight. That could complicate matters for Udall, who is already taking Republican flak for joining other Democratic senators at a February fundraiser at Steyer’s San Francisco home. But it’s also possible that Steyer could become a liability for Gardner if the billionaire uses his vast resources against the Republican.

Polls show a tight race, with one U.S. Chamber of Commerce survey last month giving Gardner a 2-point edge in a state that Obama comfortably carried twice. A recent Quinnipiac University poll had Udall up by 1 point.

‘IT’S ALL OIL FIELD’

Weld County demonstrates both the promise and peril that the energy boom has brought to the state, and the way it has scrambled some traditional political dynamics.

The county, responsible for about 80 percent of the state’s oil and gas production, has been a fossil fuel hotbed for decades. But in recent years it has felt the effects of the industry’s revolutionary advances in techniques like hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, which uses high-pressure injections of water, sand and chemicals to break up underground rock formations and extract previously hard-to-reach oil and gas supplies.

The county’s 21,000 active wells appear on farmland and in nearby towns alike, sometimes popping up just around the corner from houses and schools, and the boom has brought a swarm of customers to the area’s restaurants and hotels.

Many residents interviewed here haven’t yet started paying attention to the Senate race. But oil and gas are on most people’s minds.

“It’s all oil field right now,” said Lorena Fuentes, manager of the Double Tree Restaurant and Lounge in Platteville, saying the influx of workers has been great for her family’s business.

“It is holding up our economy here in Colorado,” said County Commissioner Barbara Kirkmeyer, a Republican who is absolutely paying attention to the election — she’s running for Gardner’s House seat.

But anti-fracking groups, complaining of hazards like water pollution, road damage and noise, are active here as well. Fracking opponents have organized a “tour of destruction” around drilling sites in Greeley, the county’s largest city, sometimes bringing reporters from national news outlets. They have also pounced on lingering resentment in the community. Some residents, for example, expressed outrage after one company proposed drilling 19 wells near an elementary school in Greeley.

Fracking, and other technologies like horizontal drilling, have also allowed oil and gas development to spread to communities that had previously turned a blind eye because it wasn’t in their backyards. Some of those have voted to ban the practice, setting up a fight not only with the industry but with the administration of Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper.

For Republicans like Gardner, hewing to the party’s “drill baby drill” stance offers few complications. Udall faces a trickier dance in trying to maintain his green credentials, despite his support from major environmental groups and some solid personal connections: He’s married to veteran environmentalist Maggie Fox, who once headed Al Gore’s Climate Reality Project, and the Udall name has a storied legacy among Western conservationists. (His uncle Stewart Udall was Interior secretary in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations.)

Some hard-core environmental activists in Colorado express dismay with Udall’s reluctance to firmly take their side.

“He’s been very much loved for years now,” said Micah Parkin, executive director of the climate activist group 350 Colorado, which is dead set against Keystone and fracking. “But as of late, some of his strong supporters really are quite concerned that he’s becoming out of touch with citizens. … He’s increasingly been in support of what we would consider extreme energy sources.”

At the same time, Colorado Republicans are trying to paint Udall as a flip-flopper on energy.

“He’s been everywhere on the map when it comes to fracking,” Colorado Republican Committee spokesman Owen Loftus said. “It depends what part of the state he’s in whether he supports it or not.” The committee released a statement last month highlighting some of Udall’s previous statements on fracking, arguing his position is “impossible to nail down.”

Udall’s campaign rejects the flip-flopper tag, and he has denounced “election-year grandstanding” on energy policy.

“Distilling this important discussion down to the politics that some people want to inject into it is frankly counterproductive,” Udall said in an interview, touting what he called his “mainstream record” on energy and the environment.

He has also criticized the proposed anti-fracking ballot initiatives, which would amend the Colorado constitution to give local communities authority over oil and gas drilling within their borders. But aides say Udall hasn’t taken a stance on the content of each individual initiative because it’s unclear which — if any — will make it in front of the voters.